Vox Logs: Kriegan ID040-R32-2525304-RAED
by lil.redd.riding.hood
Summary: Auditory recollections of a Death Korps soldier who suffered great loss and will face greater odds than they could have imagined when the warp decides to open its arms and consume them. Where the chaotic warp spits the soldier out is unknown, but the Kriegan will ultimately deliver the judgement of the Emperor or die for the cause. (will eventually be a crossover, maybe)


**_Hey there reader._**

**_If you're new to my (never-going-to-finish) stories, welcome and I hope you like. To those who have read my unfinished works and are here now, welcome back. This was originally written as a one shot, with the character dying at the end, but I've henceforth decided to take it somewhere else. I'm interested in doing a Warhammer 40,000 crossover(s) with something else, but I'm not yet sure what the other(s) should be. If you have any suggestions or requests for this Kriegan as (s)he continues on to complete their mission, please say so in a review. As always, thank you for viewing, and please... Share!_**

**_Reviews keep the author writing! - Redd_**

* * *

><p>I should have left him in the trench. Every Quartermaster before me has done it billions of times over, granting thousands of our kin the Emperor's Peace. One Las-round and it would have been it. There is red on my mask- so much of it that it feels like it's seeping in. I can't see. Is it night time already? I must have carried him for days now. Such a dark red. Must keep breathing slowly. Must keep moving. I feel the walls of the trenches under the second skin of my gloves. The walls should have been a map as easy to remember as my own number, but my mind has fled me. I keep turning right. Follow the right wall and you will find allies.<p>

I will make it.

- _We will make it_.

Heavy fire sears above my helm, fizzling out as they burrow in the wet dirt of this Emperor-forsaken planet. Give it to the fiends I say, but only to myself. There is no one else around to hear me. He has stopped talking. I check my grip on him again. A thousand times over, I check that he is still there. Crimson has stained my vision. Weeks must have gone by. Time feels alien- a xenos concept in the belly of these trenches. I turn right again.

A warm body stops me, sending me sprawling on my back with his body still on my shoulders. Voices shouting. Has it been so long since I've heard them? I don't understand their words. I put a hand out and another grabs hold, hoisting me back up. More talking. I think they ask for my number. What is my number? I do not remember. A pull on my tags gets them their answer. They turn me around.

I hear them move to check on him. Panic grips me with the tightness of a green soldier on his rifle before his first kill. I jump. Hands restrain me from all sides and I scream. No sound. There is no sound from my throat. Blood curdles there instead. The red on my mask has turned to rust. The Emperor has forgotten us.

Has it been a year? The restraints are gone and I reach his body, the fall of his breaths so shallow I can barely feel them. He mumbles. I have forgotten our own language. His fingers fumble for mine. I can hear the roar of tank treads eating mud. They are close. The mono knife is in my hand now. He has placed it there. Las-rounds and bolter-fire pepper the wall behind me.

He tries to speak again but I do not understand. I shake my head and he yells the same words over. My heartbeat is in my ears. Emperor save us. With the strength left to him he pushes me away and repeats himself, yelling through what can only be his lifeblood curdling in his throat.

Anger wells up from the depths of my stomach. His voice fades and I am alone. The rust has turned black, and I wipe it away. The Emperor may forget our struggle, but time has not forgotten me. The enemy still advances. I ready my Lasgun with the blade he gave me and look for the nearest sign of life. Masks have suddenly appeared around me.

Hundreds of masks just like his surge left and right, laying suppressing fire over the trenches and throwing grenades of all kinds into no-mans-land. One of the masks explode in a hail of machinery and gore, but I am numb to the loss. _He_ is gone. Our _regiment_ is gone. Only their dogtags and myself are left to keep their memory breathing.

And I will not forget.

_These heretics will not forget_.

The Emperor would never leave us out of his thoughts. He must have chosen me to remind the galaxy that we are not small.

I move forward, slowly at first. I have to remember how to walk. I step over his corpse, scavenging what I can, careful to avoid looking past the mask and into his eyes. Unnumbered soldiers continue their bunkered assault over the side of the trench, but I ignore them. They are numberless. As am I.

Before I can stop myself and think of a plan, I am over the lip of the trench, in plain view. Only the Emperor's will can shield me from the xenos and their masters now. My Lasgun is already at my shoulder, and I find I am loosing rounds at an ocean of endless, bloodthirsty filth. Teeth. They are just hungry teeth and hellfire. Again and again I blast las-rounds until the magazine is empty, unimpeded by the returning hail which sprays plumes of dirt and mud around me.

Is _he_ watching? Has the Emperor given him a moment to see my last stand? _Are they all watching from the back_? It doesn't matter. I am out of ammo. The mono knife will have to do. But there is nothing to swing at so far from the enemy. I have remembered how to run, and now I do. Straight for the xenos and their red armored masters, I sprint with all the fury of my entire regiment fueling my feet.

The last moments flash in front of my eyes like a holovid. I feel the exhaustion. I taste the acrid sourness of finality. I watch as I take the final leap into the infinite sea of alien hostiles, slashing about wildly, only the faintest of precision in my strikes. I can't remember why I'm fighting, only that my regiment and my God are watching.

Something cold is in my chest. Biting cold. _Bitterly cold_. I push on. I must keep attacking. More cuts and stabs are successfully driven against the enemy, but it's getting hard to breath. My mask is gone. Brief panic grips me, but then it too disappears in the wave of bodies. I'm getting colder and lights flash in front of me but I can't stop.

My limbs are too heavy to lift anymore, and I am pushed to the ground, unable to block. Unable to flee. I know I am being kicked around the battlefield- they don't notice I am still breathing. It doesn't matter. I can't see. My eyes are open but there is only black. Where the roaring of war was only a moment ago there is now only the screaming of silence. Finally I am numb. Every sense is numb. All pain is gone.


End file.
